Our Succos was beautiful. We were away for the first days, took a mini vacation with the kids and came back home for the last days.
It was wonderful spending time with my family, but the weeks before we’re quite stressful.
I knew that I had a work deadline on 10/31. I was aiming to make that date and was on track. I was actually really proud of the progress I was making, until I was notified that the deadline was not 10/31. It was changed to 10/15. So after my initial freak out, I calmed down and made a plan. I knew I could do it. We were making really great progress, so I knew I just needed to focus on getting all of those little details wrapped up.
I put in a few very late nights and made the deadline, but it wasn’t easy with all the days off for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. And of course the fact that my kids had time off of school for Tzom Gedalia and Erev Yom Kippur didn’t help much either.
In the past I’ve had work due around the holidays, but never projects of this magnitude. There was also a lot of pressure that came along with it, which didn’t make our Erev Yom Tovs easy. It also didn’t allow for easy Erev Shabbos preparation.
Things may have been rushed going into Shabbos and Yom tov, but once the candles were lit I just forgot all about it. There was simply nothing I could do, so why worry about it? I’m not saying that was easy and of course it was no fun getting back onto the computer after Shabbos, but I survived. And so did my family (even with super simple Shabbos meals).
So what’s the lesson learned? Although we cannot ‘do it all’ we can certainly try. We can rearrange our schedules, we can buy takeout food and we can meet our deadlines – the religious ones and the work ones.
Is it ideal? Of course not. I wish I could have spent more time cooking and cleaning before hand, but I couldn’t and it really wasn’t a big deal. A few weeks later no one even remembers that we didn’t have gefilte fish and the sweet potatoes tasted a bit different than they usually do.
How do you handle stressful work deadlines?
Until next time,
Shaindy
